Saxon and Scythian
Printed From: History Community ~ All Empires
Category: General History
Forum Name: Alternative History
Forum Discription: Discussion of Unorthodox Historical Theories & Approaches
URL: http://www.allempires.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=15241
Printed Date: 16-Apr-2024 at 18:45
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Topic: Saxon and Scythian
Posted By: Suren
Subject: Saxon and Scythian
Date Posted: 04-Oct-2006 at 22:43
| Is there any connection between Saxons and Scythian? |
Replies:
Posted By: Suren
Date Posted: 04-Oct-2006 at 23:15
| I think there is a narrow connection but I didn't find enough evidence from good online sources to back it up perfect. |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 05-Oct-2006 at 11:11
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"The History of the Anglo-Saxons" by Sharon Turner (1768-1847):
"The Saxons were a German or Teutonic, that is, a Gothic or Scythian tribe; and of the various Scythian nations which have been recorded, the Sakai, or Sacae are the people from whom the descent of the Saxons may be inferred, with the least violation of probability. Sakai-suna, or the sons of the Sakai, abbreviated into Saksun, which is the same sound as Saxon, seems a reasonable etymology of the word Saxon." ------------- 
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Posted By: Zagros
Date Posted: 05-Oct-2006 at 12:40
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That is conjecture she has no proof whatsoever she merely speculates. I have read that piece written by Sharon Turner, she also said that the Saxons were at some point defeated by the Persians and sent scuttering across Trans-Asia to end up in England.
Actually, there is no connection between the words Saxon and Scythian. ------------- |
Posted By: Boreasi
Date Posted: 05-Oct-2006 at 15:36
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Scyt-ian refers to "shot" or "offspring".
Sax-on refers to "part".
In the Nordic languages - which is supposed to still maintain its ancient semantics...
These etnicities have had different languages, as the Scytian belongs to the Fenno-Ugrian part and the Saxon to the Germanic part of old Eurasia.
The old division-line is still existing, although both languages have changed, due to Greek respectively Roman influence. But the old cultural border can be seen between Swedes and Finns, as well as along the river Wizla/Weichsel. Here the Slavic people relate to the Scytians while the Germans/Austrians and Swiz descend from the Saxons.
Though - it may be significant to stress that they both originate from one and the same source, - namely from a small group of h.s. sapiens that survived the end of ice-time in the Baltic, where the caucasian features developed... ------------- Be good or be gone. |
Posted By: Zagros
Date Posted: 05-Oct-2006 at 17:27
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urgh? ------------- |
Posted By: Sharrukin
Date Posted: 07-Oct-2006 at 02:47
| When Tacitus wrote his Germania, (c. AD 96), he did not know about any "Saxons". Instead he knew about a group of tribes where the Saxons eventually were known to have been located. When the geographer Ptolemy (c. AD 150) wrote about Germany, that group of tribes no longer existed, but instead, their names were replaced by the name "Saxons". The conjecture, is that sometime between the time of Tacitus and Ptolemy, those tribes mentioned by Tacitus formed a league, much like the later Franks and Alemanni, which was named the Saxons. It is thus very unlikely that the Saxons had an Iranian origin. The Saxons in terms of ethnogenesis only originates in the 2nd century AD. |
Posted By: Aelfgifu
Date Posted: 07-Oct-2006 at 10:15
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The problem with both ptolemy and Tacitus is that they sooo very much wanted to divide the world in nice little cubicles to analise and name. The Greeks and Romans were very fond of nice clear divisions. Unfortunately, reality back then was no more clear cut or obvious than it is now. Peoples change, move and are re-named, and therefore are rather difficult to keep track of by a couple of desk-bound writers...
As the scythians are described as short and dark and the saxons as tall and blonde, I'd say there is very little chance they are the same, just because their names both start with an S. ------------- 
Women hold their councils of war in kitchens: the knives are there, and the cups of coffee, and the towels to dry the tears. |
Posted By: Sharrukin
Date Posted: 07-Oct-2006 at 11:35
| There is no doubt that what Tacitus and Ptolemy presented were mere "snapshots" of the situation in Germany. The Germanic tribes were notorious for forming "fly-by-night" leagues or even new tribes only to reform into new ones under a new leader. However, by the mid-third century AD, those leagues gained a certain coherency such as the Franks and Alemanni and no doubt, the Saxons. |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 09-Oct-2006 at 17:56
| Agriculturalists v Nomads |
Posted By: Komnenos
Date Posted: 09-Oct-2006 at 19:06
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Honestly, this is simply ludicrous. As Sharrukin already mentioned, first of all the Saxons were a conglomerate of smaller Germanic tribes, a confederation of tribes, not unlike the Franks, that had formed relatively late in the first centuries AD. And secondly, these tribes were Northern Germanic tribes, descendents of pre-historic settlers in Europe that had lived there ever since homo sapiens finally arrived in these regions, with very little later influx.
The Eastern Germanic tribes might have come into contact, mainly on their wanderings in the Russian steppes, and mixed with all kinds of people, but the people that later became the Saxons were a pretty settled bunch and didn't walk about too much until they set over to England in the 5th century.
I wish we could stop these dilettantic attempts on etymology, there are only so many sounds a human can make, and if two similar appaer on two different corners of the earth, it does not mean they are in any way related. And if anybody ever tries again to tell us that virtually all people in the universe and beyond are the descendents of some roaming Turkic, proto- or post- or what ever tribe, I'm gonna scream. ------------- [IMG]http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i137/komnenos/crosses1.jpg"> |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 11-Oct-2006 at 10:40
This is a fact that among all European languages, old Saxon language is the most similar one to Persian language. Don't you think that there should be a reason for this huge similarity?
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Posted By: Aelfgifu
Date Posted: 11-Oct-2006 at 13:42
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A lot of these Saxon words are very similar to Middle Dutch as well. It just proves they are both Indo-European. -------------
Women hold their councils of war in kitchens: the knives are there, and the cups of coffee, and the towels to dry the tears. |
Posted By: Brainstorm
Date Posted: 12-Oct-2006 at 08:11
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The only connection i could find ,would be the existence of Sarmatian mercenaries in Britain,during late Roman times.
(its known that Sarmatians replaced Scythians in the same area) I m sorry that i dont have much time to write an extend text about this. The most surprising similarities (or coincidence of course) ,are the use of dragon-similar in the artifacts of Saxons and the "flags" of Sarmatians, and the myth of Exculiber. Scythians (and probably sarm) ,used to build tombs ,placing on top long swords,stucked on the ground or between rocks . This is mentioned also by Herodotus,who calls them temples-tombs dedicated to Ares (god of War),as "he is the only God they worship). (Osprey's :the "Sarmatians",the "Scythians",Herodot's "Istoriai" ) |
Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 21-Oct-2006 at 11:58
Well, first of all, Persian should be closer to old European languages since the new ones have been moving away since the common root for an additional 1000+ years. Further, only a few words does not prove anything, you need to look at syntax, grammar, all kinds of things. From all we know that list may be all that shows any similarity. Even modern Swedish is closer to that than Persian anyway, and that's not a descendant of Saxon. So no, I wouldn't make any conclusions whatsoever, beside that Saxon and Persian have a common root (along with German, English, Italian etc). In general, etymological "evidence" should be treated very carefully and never used as proof itself.
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Posted By: Zagros
Date Posted: 21-Oct-2006 at 12:10
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Iranian languages are satem and Germanic languages are centum, if they were so closely related, they would at least be in the same group, but they are not. ------------- |
Posted By: Vedam
Date Posted: 21-Oct-2006 at 14:30
Agree. They are from the same family but not closely related.
I've also heard theories that the Scythians who were called in India the Sakas are the same as the tribe that Buddha belonded to the Sakyas. Even though Buddha was born on the India-nepal boarder and the Scythians an Iranic group did not enter India until 500 years later, and that was from the North-west.
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Posted By: Zagros
Date Posted: 21-Oct-2006 at 14:36
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At least that much is recorded. Not all movements of the nomads could conceivably have been recorded. ------------- |
Posted By: Boreasi
Date Posted: 21-Oct-2006 at 22:31
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The old norse talk of "Sakser" and "Saks-land", which later becomes "Saxon" and "Saxony" in modern English. The same source-material also describe Vaner or Vender as the neighbours of old Saxony. The Vends would polulate the entire eastern area of Europe, from Poland to Ural. Within this enormous area they would have different tribes of Vaner/Vends; K-vens, Vene-jas, Balts, Ros-ian, Moldo-van, Transyl-van to Huner/Huns and Hun-garia. Before they reached Bull-gard and Mikla-gard, where the people were considered Greek and not "Russian". The mix between these cultures finally created the "Sla-von" peoples and the "Sla-von-ic" languages of present Eurasia. Though, both the Greek and the Finno-Ugrian language still exists within their original concepts - in the rural parts of Greek Makedonia and Finland, respectively. The Roman, Greek and Indian refer to this "Vendic people" as "Schytians". In the end their culture and their kind were consumed by the Greek church, which created the Sla-von peoples and the slavic languages, while the meeting between these Vends/Schytians and tropical Asians, finally created the Tar-tars and the Tur-ki's, as well as the First Per-son of the old Per-si-a. Vaner/Vends and Schytians/Russians-Ucranians are basicly the same people. Even if the first letters in their various names still don't match, we may still understand the deeper semantics of their etymology - given that a required insigth is present.
------------- Be good or be gone. |
Posted By: Suren
Date Posted: 22-Oct-2006 at 01:51
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If it is correct that old norse talk about "sakser" or sakland which become saxon it is clear for me that there is some connection. I know my father is from a mountainous town in north of Iran and people in that town have an special language that is very close to old avestan and old persian. the name of town in several centries ago was Sakser and I know from history of this town and researchs in ancient sites that Sakai people lived and built this town and called it sakser ( town of sakais). it's real name is sagsar now. this town is isolated and people didn't mixed with other people a lot. this can't be just random name. this can lead us to a good point. |
Posted By: Suren
Date Posted: 22-Oct-2006 at 04:02
| I am curious about this new point. |
Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 22-Oct-2006 at 06:38
Quit it there. I've never seen the form "Sakser" before (it might be modern Norwegian though); -er is actualy a modern Scandinavian suffix indicating a people, eg zuluer, kineser, amerikaner, greker, ester etc. Saxland means land of the Saxons and was a common form - Bretland, Valland, Blåland, Särkland etc. The Old Norse form (and the modern Swe. too, btw) of Saxons was Saxar and -ar is just another common suffix for a people (eg modern Swedish ryssar, tyskar, danskar etc). Sax means a one-egged sword (or a scissor - think of how they look) - just as the Franks the Saxon confederation was named after their typical weapon.
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 22-Oct-2006 at 16:16
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If you look at these words carefully then you will see that the similarity is really huge, each word has many things to say. am, I am (it means the subject can be ignored in both languages) -------------
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Posted By: Suren
Date Posted: 23-Oct-2006 at 18:52
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The adherents of the Saka theory point out that the burial customs of the Scythians and the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking - Vikings show certain similarities. Furthermore, the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_English_language - Old English chroniclers write that when the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saxon_people - Saxons invaded England ca. 400 AD together with the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angli - Angli ,
they "sent back to Scythia for reinforcements". The implication is that
the Saxons considered themselves to be Scythians -- the name having
traveled with them even though they were far away from the region the
Greeks had labelled "Scythia". However, the chroniclers have most
probably taken over the name Scythia and its somewhat imprecise usage
from the Latin literature; Scythia was identified with Sweden because
of a superficial similarity of the two names (due to the fact that
Scythia was pronounced [sitia] in Medieval Latin). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saka |
Posted By: Aelfgifu
Date Posted: 24-Oct-2006 at 04:19
Nice wiki quote, now how about thinking yourself?
Unfortunately, the wikisite does not say which source mentions Scythia, which is a pity, because it must be one I've never seen before, and I'm pretty sure I saw them all... I have the Anglo Saxon chronicle right here on my desk, and by 449 it says: 'They then send to the Angeln, bidding them send more help.' In Anglo-Saxon: 'Hi ða sende to Angle 7 heton heom sendan mare fultum'
Two lines further, it says 'Those men came fron three tribes of Germany; from the Old-Saxons, from the Angeles, from the Jutes.' In Anglo-Saxon: 'Þa comon þa menn of þrim mægþum Germanie, of Ealdseaxum, of Anglum, of Iotum'
In Bede it says: 'Then the nation of the Angles, or Saxons, being invited by the aforesaid king, arrived in Britain with three long ships, and had a place assigned them to reside in by the same king, in the eastern part of the island, that they might thus appear to be fighting for their country, whilst their real intentions were to enslave it.' and 'Those who came over were of the three most powerful nations of Germany Saxons, Angles, and Jutes.' http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/bede-book1.html - And Gildas says: 'Then all the councillors, together with that proud tyrant Gurthrigern [Vortigern], the British king, were so blinded, that, as a protection to their country, they sealed its doom by inviting in among them (like wolves into the sheep-fold), the fierce and impious Saxons, a race hateful both to God and men, to repel the invasions of the northern nations.' ( 'Their mother-land, finding her first brood thus successful, sends forth a larger company of her wolfish offspring, which sailing over, join themselves to their bastard-born comrades.' http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/gildas-full.html - Anyway, whatever source Wiki used, you should really read it before copy-pasting it without comment. I do not know what you were trying to prove, but even the Wiki-Article clearly rejects the theory as far-fetched. -------------
Women hold their councils of war in kitchens: the knives are there, and the cups of coffee, and the towels to dry the tears. |
Posted By: Zagros
Date Posted: 24-Oct-2006 at 10:15
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Well done, another incessant nonsense put to rest. I wonder what drives such disrespectful fabrications which evidently lead the more naive astray? I think I just answred my own question. ------------- |
Posted By: Aelfgifu
Date Posted: 24-Oct-2006 at 10:39
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Here is the part of the Wiki-article directly following the above quote:
So apparently the whole idea for this connection came from the Nazi's. Now they are a really nice example on how not to conduct lingusitical and anthropological research. -------------
Women hold their councils of war in kitchens: the knives are there, and the cups of coffee, and the towels to dry the tears. |
Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 24-Oct-2006 at 12:11
What says the subject can be ignored in both cases? I don't know enough Saxon to say anything about it. Suffixes instead of 'to' is common among Germanic languages - in fact English is the language that deviates, Gothic, Scandinavian (using -a or -e), Icelandic, German (where the suffix -en is used) all does that.
I could do the same with modern Swedish as well:
I could go on with the whole list, but the table I copied didn't allow more. What does this prove then? Clearly, this is closer than the Persian. However, the answer is that is proves nothing, except that Swedish and Saxon as well as Persian are related languages with a common past. It doesn't say ANYTHING about the history of the peoples. There is no way you can say Saxons came from Persian deduced from this, no more than you can claim Persians are in fact descendants from a bunch of Swedes who wanted more sun and travelled south.
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Posted By: Suren
Date Posted: 24-Oct-2006 at 15:30
 it can be vise versa bunch of persian who scaped from sun burn to cold montain of sweden.Any way I was thinking maybe there is a conection closer than Indo-european seperation between Saka and Saxon ( not german and persian). about that article from wiki I wasn't sure becuase there is no source for that in wiki, so I thought other people can help us about that.
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 24-Oct-2006 at 18:21
Yep, that's the point; it doesn't prove anything :)
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Posted By: Boreasi
Date Posted: 28-Oct-2006 at 01:35
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It proves a common origin of culture. That imminently includes cross-continental relationships, which in turn indicates genetical relationships.
Which narrows the question down to WHERE this area of (common) origin existed. The dating of Eurasian setlements - from Hispanà to the Himalayas - should reveal some clues...?! ------------- Be good or be gone. |
Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 28-Oct-2006 at 05:55
In any case you missed my point: what some are trying to imply here is that the Saxons were not Germanic, but Persian, which the linguistical arguments doesn't support at all - that was my point.
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Posted By: think
Date Posted: 28-Oct-2006 at 09:00
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The Blacks speak English because of where they were situated. |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 28-Oct-2006 at 15:20
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Iranians themselves have always believed that their oiginal land was too cold because it has been clearly mentioned in Avesta. The first of the good lands and countries which I, Ahura Mazda, created, was the Airyana Vaeja (Land of Aryans), by the Vanguhi Daitya. -------------
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Posted By: Suren
Date Posted: 28-Oct-2006 at 20:57
| It probably mentions siberia or somewhere in north of caspian sea. |
Posted By: think
Date Posted: 29-Oct-2006 at 05:27
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Say Iranians were an ethnic group that moved south, how long ago would that have been ? |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 29-Oct-2006 at 12:40
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It is not clear, probably around 3800-4200 yaers ago of course just based on the archaeological and linguistic evidences. -------------
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Posted By: Boreasi
Date Posted: 02-Nov-2006 at 08:30
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Cyrus,
Quote; "There are ten winter months there, two summer months; and those are cold for the waters, cold for the earth, cold for the trees."
This climate does not exist anymore in Eurasia. Not even at Spitzbergen, the northernmost habitat in the world, do we find a summer shorter than 4 months. Doesn't that prove that this Avesta-story are basicly fantasy - or?!
Another possible explanation is the one the old sayings actually refer to the real origin of the Sakas, Bactrians and old Persians - in the land "behind the northern wind" - at a time when the shores of the Baltic Ocean and the White Sea are kept open of ice. In 1998 they discovered the remains of such a culture inside the Baltic region and the White Sea, already 40.000 years ago. The last discoveries from southern Finland even says that there have been human populations there already 72.000 years BP...
Styrbjorn,
Please check some basic Norse litterature. Snorre Sturlasson is full of "Saks-land" and "Saksere". Also check the stories about "Atle" and the Huns ("Huner") - that arrived in western Europe to help chase the Roman forces out of Northern Eurasia. The Norse scriptures call them "Budlunger" too. (Means; "Messengers"/"Sent for").
Today we understand that these people were Caucasians, which is the overall point here - as we compare Saxons and Schytians. We also know that Attila and the Huns came from Russia/Ucraine/Georgia - i.e. from the areas that the Greeks described as "Schytia"....
Attila made Buda-pest his stronghold during this lifelong enteprise. The Hungarian population have both an etnic and cultural heritage that confirm their ties to the indigenous tribes of eastern Eurasia, namely the Fenno-Ugrians. Before the Greek/Slav expansion northwards - the entire area of greater Russia all belonged to a Fenno-Ugrian culture.
Consequently the Scytians and Saxons have paralell histories - as neigbours and trading-partners. The Eurasian civilisations were all basicly Caucasian, even if they deveolped characteristically different languages - where the "Fenno-Ugric" populated the east, while the "German" (Celt, etc.) inhabitted western Europe. Since these major borders still separate "east" and "west" we may understand that the Schytian as the Saxons have been populating the eastern resp. western hemisphere of Eurasia over the last a 10.000 years.
Thus there is no reason - per se - to disbelive the stories that tells of Saxons that at some point have moved into a part of Anatolia, to repopulate an rebuild areas that have been depopulated due to natural or political/social disasters. We have paralell stories about tribe after tribe of Celts, Van-dals, Berbers and Goths that went out of Scandinavia. So, why not some Saxons - who were Europes master-farmers in their time?
If you look really close you will find that neither Swedes, Danes nor Germans share the exactly same gene-pool. Abymore. But the outrigth paralells of genetics, culture and constitutional laws does prove that they have shared a common origin - as the first group of Homo S.s. acutally managed to adapt to the conditions of ice-time. As this adaption became genetic we had the first "caucasians", who developed highly specific features in response to the cold and dark time of ice-time. The origin of these "proto-Eurasians" are found in the Baltic region, where traces of 36.000 years old habitats have been found.
Only this adaption - achieved over hundreds of generation, under the isolation of ice-time - can explain the incredibly rapid spread these people could produce - populating the entire northern hemisphere in less than 300 years. One should add that they started immediatly after ice-time - and they manage to spread all the eay from the Pyrenees to the great wall, south of Manchuria. Which means that they walked out of ice-time fully adapted, highly skilled and well equipped to cultivate the harsh nature of the arctic climate-zone - even on the barren lands of post-glacial Eurasia.
------------- Be good or be gone. |
Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 03-Nov-2006 at 08:20
"Saksere" is modern Norwegian. Reread my post, I never said they didn't mention the name, just that 'saxar' is the Old Norse variant. Buðlung doesn't actually mean anything, since it's a dynastic name akin to Yngling, Skjöldung etc. The only reason I mentioned it in the first place was that it "convinced" someone there was a connection because there was a place called "Sakser".
I think you misunderstand a bit what the Saxons really were - I suggest reading Sharrukin's posts again. The Huns came to Europe several centuries after the Saxon federation was mentioned the first time.
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 03-Nov-2006 at 12:50
Not fantasy, but there is obviously exaggeration, however we don't know their definition of "Winter", it has also been mentioned that the longest night of the year at Winter solstice, the birthday of Mithra (God of Light and Sun), is 18 hours long, there was no reason to lie, it shows there was really a long winter. -------------
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Posted By: Boreasi
Date Posted: 04-Nov-2006 at 01:51
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Cyrus,
If we recon 18 hours nigth - at midwinter - we reach north to the 60th paralell - which definitly places the origin of Mitra north of Persia and far into "Schytia". The 60th paralell crosses Oslo - Uppsala - Helsinki - Petersburgh and Perm, where the old Schytians had their northern relatives...
http://uralica.com/400ad.htm - http://uralica.com/400ad.htm
http://uralica.com/900ad.htm - http://uralica.com/900ad.htm (Schytians/Huns going westwards...)
The Schytian relations to the "happy Hyperborea" up north may be underestimated;
http://www.dlc.fi/~kokov/perm/index.htm - http://www.dlc.fi/~kokov/perm/index.htm
In this site you may find indications that the origin of the Avesta litterature were closely related to the etnic folklore of the Fenno-Ugrians, as it is shown in the "Kalevala".
The heartland of the latter are located to north-western Russia and Finland, where the very oldest habitats of modern man are located.
http://www.geocities.com/ojoronen/EARLYFIN.HTM#origin - http://www.geocities.com/ojoronen/EARLYFIN.HTM#origin
Click some images;
http://www.dlc.fi/~kokov/perm/index.htm - http://www.dlc.fi/~kokov/perm/index.htm
As you may see from these pics and articles AN "arctic culture" did exist wothin this area, DURING the last phase of ice-time (40.000 - 12.000 BP). That may very well explain the very specific description of a "summer of only two months". During the overall paert of all these millenias that climate was an actual fact - in the area north of Perm-Petersbourough-Botnia, where 40.000 years old traces of modern humans have been found.
Btw.: The extreme winter and darkness of the north also offers a logic explanation to how the caucasians adapted to the mortal lack of sun-ligth, by loosing pigmentation to become bleek and blue-eyed. Thus we may also understand why the sun and the fire was the most sacred realms of their existence - an attitude we still find in the philosophy of Zoraster... Styrbjorn,
Quote;
"Saksere" is modern Norwegian. Reread my post, I never said they didn't mention the name, just that 'saxar' is the Old Norse variant. Buðlung doesn't actually mean anything, since it's a dynastic name akin to Yngling, Skjöldung etc. The only reason I mentioned it in the first place was that it "convinced" someone there was a connection because there was a place called "Sakser".
I think you misunderstand a bit what the Saxons really were - I suggest reading Sharrukin's posts again. The Huns came to Europe several centuries after the Saxon federation was mentioned the first time."
The TERM "Sakser/Saxon" exists in the entire north of Europe, with small variations in spelling. Both Hungarians and Samojeds know of them as "Saksa/Saksalaiset".
Sharukkins reply simply states what ONE Greek and ONE Roman scholar are able/willing to communicate. Do not forget their possible bias, as they were both part of pretty confused and rather naughty politics - where the lands up north were objects of stigmatisation - and possible conquest. Already in the time of Pliny the "barbarians" of the high north were defined as "primitives" - a consept that modern archeology already have proved to be definitly wrong. Making these comments to be "basic facts" is nothing but an old, out-dated, scholarly presumption. Tacitus and other Romans MAY have threated the Germans just the way Goebels described the Jews... Quoting them does not prove or disprove any of the general outlines we discuss here.
Maybe you could re-read my last replies - and comment on the general outline I made, as well as the sources reffered to. They seem to agree on that the Schytians was a southern branch of the Fenno-Ugrians, that actually populated eastern Eurasia already during the Mesolithic/Neolethic. Simultaniously the "German" (western) populations were spreading throughout the western part of Eurasia, that laid open and uninhabbitted - north of the line from the Pyrenees (via the Alps/Balkans/ Caucasia) to Himalaya and Manchuria.
I also made a point of the mere fact that both of them - still - belong to the Caucasian etnicity - which point back to a common origin. Considering that they share an arctic outlook, culture and surrounding we may deduce that Schytians and Saxons have an old ancestry in common, just like Swedes and Finns do. Please enjoy these sites;
http://uralica.com/finmaps.htm - http://uralica.com/finmaps.htm
http://www.geocities.com/ojoronen/EARLYFIN.HTM#net - http://www.geocities.com/ojoronen/EARLYFIN.HTM#net
PS.:
As far as we know - from saga-material and exacvations combined - there is a possibility existing, that the first family of agriculturalists who came to Sweden had a family-head named Sven - and/or Svea. Old sagas says they placed their residence in Uppsala, from where they created off-shots, that eventually came to populate the vaious lands/counties of todays Sweden. In that case we had the Yng-linga-family as the original family that created all swedish counts, earls and peasants. Translated "yng-linga-et" means "young-language-family".
Meanwhile the Danes constituted the "Pal-ett" ("Pole-Family"), from which a branch were populating the shores and lands east of Denmark. Later this population were "saxed" ("cut") from their Danish ancestors and a new capitol made at "Branden-borg". Thus they could have become "Saxons". Perhaps.
Since the Danes building "Danevirke" (740-50 AD) as The Defense towards the brutal crusaders from the south, their northern allies started to relate to their common shield against Romes corruption, greed and violence. Thus they were reffered to as "Shielders" or "Children of The Shield", as we may transelate the old Norse term "Skjold-unger/Skjellong". We still have the Danish name Sjel-land refering to these times - and the heartland of the Nordic defence against the first wave of war that finally reached Denmark and the entire Baltics - from the south.
PS.: Whats the difference between "dynastic" and "etnic" - in this case? If all Danes are defined as "Children of old Dan, the First Dane and (thus) the legitimate King of Jutland" - whats the difference between "dynastic" and "etnic". Or are the people populating Denmark today not really Danes anymore? Please explain the discrepancies substantiating your argument.
http://www.dlc.fi/~kokov/perm/index.htm -
------------- Be good or be gone. |
Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 04-Nov-2006 at 05:10
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Boreasi, you lay way too much weight to words alone. Using words and trying to create a history from them is a great fallacy. You don't know the difference between dynastic and ethnic? Then I can only suggest you pick your nearest dictionary and check out the terms.
The dynastic names shall not be translated and used as an argument because it's pointless. It makes as much sense as claiming that since Winston Churchill's last name means what it does, he was probably born in a church on a hill. Those are names, and names only. The old dynastic names are created as "Creator of dynasty"+a suffix meaning descendants of. The creator of the Ynglinga dynasty was Yngve and it means descendants/related of Yngve. It has absolutely nothing to do with "young language" (-ling is just a suffix). Same goes for Budlung, Skjöldung, Niflung, Gylfing etc. Thus any arguments based on those is void.
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Posted By: Boreasi
Date Posted: 05-Nov-2006 at 02:12
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Please re-read my argument on "etnic"/"dynastic" - and try to explain your former statements that I just questioned. (No need to use cheap humor from a modern dictionary.)
---
Further you try to explain that a great number of historical words and names do not count for anything. If that was the case we would a hopeless task trying to explain any old culture, with any sense to our contemporary minds. Do you really think that all our regular surnames, family-names and national/etnic names just came falling out of the sky??
Your own example with Churchhill just contradicts the essence of your critique. Or do you really think that this familyname have nothing to do - at all - with churches and hills?!
The names of Gylfings, Skjoldungs, Budlungs, Ynglings, etc. have an even deeper root in their respective culture, as they obviously served as names for larger groups of peoples.
Stating that Yng/Ung and Ling/Lingua has nothing to do with classic semantics is a pretty blasted argument. Unless the Schytian came out of Swahili-land, but "Skytia" as we find it in the northern hemisphere - we have to relate to the obvious IE semantics of historical words, names and expressions from the caucasian area.
My guess is that you still have to discover how linguists normally work to interpretate old and ancient languages - by aproaching the essential expressions of the closest culture(s) known to the the case-object, to form a basis for closer investigations. Using the classic Scandinavian languages (Swedish and Finnish) to explore the roots of past and present languages of Northern Europe is nothing but logic. Especially when it fits - beyond doubt - with the historical material known about the old Saxon and Schytians.
Like finding the "Saxon" in old Norse (Saksa) as well as modern Norwegian
(Sakser). When the same name appears in the Finno-Ugrian world as well - in the terms "Sakson-ma/Saksa-laiset" (= Germany/Germans) - we have to presume that this word have both, 1. A genuin meaning, and 2. An ancient origin.
When Greek and Roman writers were to name this peoples they may have used other names. What the indigenous Europeans called Frank-land and Saks-land the Latin invaders came to call "Gaul" and "Germania". Different views, off course - but who was "rigth"?
We may find that such old misconceptions still create confusion. A typical example of that is the old distinction made between Celts and Germans. Todays archeologists have had a hard time explaining the basic differences between these two, supposedly different cultures. Which have made some historians wonder if Caesars descriptions weren't both biased and inaccurate. In that case we have to re-consider the validity of "Il Bello Gallico" and other biased sources - as invalid.
Funny that a many Swedes still trust old, foreign and biased sources about Northern Europe - prior the basic semantics of your own, ancient language.
------------- Be good or be gone. |
Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 05-Nov-2006 at 14:12
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Frankly, I don't know where to start. You made a desert out of a sand crystal, totally taking my comments out of context and applying meanings that were never there in the first place, so I'm extremely confused about what you are aiming at. But let me try to start from scratch and answer your last post instead.
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About dynasties vs etnicities. You presume Yngling, Budlung etc applied to whole peoples. They did not. They applied only to the ruling dynasties, and that alone. There were no Ynglinga people; there were Swedes and there were Norwegians, ruled by the Ynglinga dynasty.
Congratulations, yes that is the case! There will NEVER be possible to fully explain everything, sources are very scarce from this time, and there will never be any 'truth' about this.
Yes, they have a meaning - but that doesn't mean anything. Those dynastic names comes from the person who started the dynasty. Eg Yngve gave rise to the name Yngling. The ling part is just a suffix, not a word of it's own. "Ling" has absolutely nothing to do with languages in Germanic anyway, lingua is an Italic word, which makes me wonder whether you know what you are talking about or just going on intuition. Also, there is no such thing as the Gylfings.
1. probably. But the meaning can be irrelevant.
2. definitely not. The Finns borrowed the word from the Norse.
Anyway, the point I'm making is that you cannot rely on linguistics to write history.
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 06-Nov-2006 at 08:32
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A Question: http://library.flawlesslogic.com/voluspa.htm - http://library.flawlesslogic.com/voluspa.htm Ash and Elm: Ask and Embla are two tree trunks that the gods find washed up on the shore, from which they will form man and woman respectively. The early Saxon kings of Kent (the Aescingas) traced their line back to an Asc ("Ash-Tree"), the son of the legendary twin-figure Hengest (Bede, Hist. Eccles. 2.5). Isn't it the same "Mashya Tree" (Zoroastrian Adam) in Avesta? -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 06-Nov-2006 at 11:07
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There is much resemblence yes. There is much overlapping between beliefs, but the question whether we can call these two "the same" or not is unanswerable. Edit: I might have to clarify that the Saxon king Asc mentioned shares nought but the name with first man Ask. It seems pretty unnecessary and quite misleading to mention that with the origin myth. I saw they did that in the link, but it makes as much sense as mentioning Adam of Bremen when you describe the Christian creation myth.
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 06-Nov-2006 at 12:42
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Why not "the same"? Saxona and Sakstana, almost the same name, the same region (northern and eastern Europe), the same race (Caucasian), the same language, the same beliefs, ... -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 06-Nov-2006 at 13:42
I was talking about the creation myth, not the peoples.
And it has never been shown they are the same region, same race, same language and same beliefs - and definitely not same time.
Further, you can't just apply the Norse creation myth oon the Saxons, think that tiny part of the whole mythology shows resemblance and draw the conclusion they had the same beliefs... It's like saying Soviet and USA had the same economic system because they both used paper money. |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 07-Nov-2006 at 07:51
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If you have noticed, we have in fact compared Norse and Persian cultures and have found many similarities between them. Saxon culture was not the same as Norse culture and Scythian culture was not the same as Persian culture but they existed between these two cultures. I think Saxon and Saka are just two differnt names of one nation, just as Ymir in Norse mythology and Yima in Persian mythology are just different names of their first being. -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 07-Nov-2006 at 08:04
There are more similarities with Greek and Norse mythology than between Persian and Norse. So maybe the Greeks were Persians as well? The Saxon language is not even in the same branch as Persian. How do you explain that? And the fact that there were Saxons in Germania several hundred years before any Scythians came ariding? |
Posted By: Boreasi
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2006 at 00:59
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Cyrus,
Please understand that where some see just paper others see money. What I call may call wood others may insist are threes, - "only". In our cionfused day and age many find negations to be simple and safe - even if it is dishonest or outrigh dumb.
Growing up with the traditional view on Nordic history many Scandinavian conventionalists insist that the old Norse civilisation were nothing but a scattered bunch of primitive survivors, forced out to the brim of the old cultures - until the Greek-Roman church arrived "slowly civilizing these brute bastards". Even if the Catholic and Ortodox churches lost their political impact more than a century ago we still have the long-termed effect of their millenial rule, where this explanation was indoctrinated in each and every institution and book about European culture. Only a decade ago we still believed that all the northern forms of culture and civilisation came from the Greek and Roman antiquity, with the help of the ancient Egyptians, Sumerian and Assyrian. Thus we could rest assured that we had a solid explanation of a "evolutionary" process that originatied in the "very first cities" of Ur, Uruk, Ninive and Petra. It fitted in with the Biblical stories, explaining the Judeo-Christian tradition as the origin of modern civilisation.
That worked pretty well as long as India was still a colony and China was basicly closed to modern science. Only the massive myths of the Tibetan myths as well as the Avestas and the Vedas made some of us somewhat uneasy about that, ALTHOUGH they both "lacked proves" of historical relevance. Today, as the Chinese mummies have proven Scytian migration to the northern China, we suddenly see an old Fenno-Scandian culture of Caucasians - that once populated the empty, arid continent north of the Caucasian mountains - from the western border-rivers of Torneå and Wizla/Weichsel all over to the Chinese Wall. As they establish in the various landscapes we get the sub-groups that the Greek and Roman conquerors later name by the respective regions. Thus we get "Phrygians", "Dachians", "Schytians", "Huns", "Bactrians", "Vans" or "Veneti", etc. As the Greek expand north we get "Slavs", while the Asian/Indian immigrants (Gypsies), traders (Phoenicians) and invaders (Semites) finally arrived to create mixed etnicities - such as the Romani, Libanese and Tartars.
The specific origin of the Persian culture seem to be based on an old Greek population that was re-inforced by the Scythian (Aryan) culture. Later it was heavily influenced by the Indian/Asian soldiers that invaded the areas around the Persian Gulf. Finally they came to invade the Anatolian areas and the plains between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea - gaining controll of the Anatolian resources as well as the trade-routes between Asia and Europe.
See also; http://www.clanrossi.com/ - http://www.clanrossi.com/
Map from Wikipedia;
 Map of Dr. Elisabeth Barber;
http://library.thinkquest.org/J003409/china.htm - http://library.thinkquest.org/J003409/china.htm Styrbjorn,
How do you prove that the Scytians did NOT exist simultaniously with the Saxons? How do you prove that the Saxons were NOT Germans? How do you distinguish between Ask, Asc, Ash and Askur - or Em, Elm, Al or Alm? Are they different threes - or (just) different words (languages/dialects) for the same three?!
And how do you explain that you consequently reject the simple basics about Scythians and Persians that we have elaborated on already - where the relations between Saxons, Greek, Persian and Schytian are pretty well elaborated already?!
Since the Scandinavians have been divided in two different cultures and etnicities - east and west of the Botnic Ocean - for the last 10.000 years, it should not be all that difficult to assess the basic outlines between eastern and western Europe as paralell realms. We still find Finno-Ugrians and Slavs to the east, while the Scandinavians and the Germans roam the west.
Recent genetics even simplify this picture when it is now concluding that the basic origin of all the northern cultures actually have populated their respective areas already since ice-time, while the southern part of Europe and Eurasia have seen more mixed dishes, due to the simple fact that the arctic and the tropic cultures have met - to mix and mingle - in the sub-arctic/sub-tropic areas. Thus you find a history of travel and trade back and forth between these areas already 7.000 years ago. Later we find traces of agressive intrusion as well, finally resulting in massive war-campaigns.
Due to the last two millenias of wars and massive migrations we may have a hard time to understand the origins and the ancient history of Trans-Caucasia. But there is no reason to debunk honest attempts and reject plain discoveries - even if they may APPEAR simplistic to the Haeglian mind-set. In life as in history you may find that simple clarity is a basic characteristic of a scientifc truth.
If you have a complete understanding maths and relativity you may express it very short and simple. It may take you a couple of decades to reach the entire understanding higher maths and you will need a load of books to understand the various aspects of the physical universe as we know it. And yet we have people running around claiming that it can be explain in a short and simple formula of four signs - only. Can you prove them wrong? Facing the Quantum theory you could not even explain why they are rigth. Simply because we have to accept that 99% true is the closest we can get. Thus I would recommend that you drop - at least for a while - the absolute demand of 100% identicality to accept paralellity between the historical cultures of Schytians, Huns, Hungarians and Finns. Understanding the width of the old Scytian populations - from Danube to Tarim - we may have to accept their influence on the Persian culture. We may even have to accept the possibility that they both originated from the southern Baltics, that seems to have been the hartland of the old Corded Ware culture that once spread from Weichsel to the Tarim Bassin. If the Persian traditions have any significance on its own, we may even have to accept that their ancestors - that they call Aryans - came from this northern hemisphere. Likewise we have to accept that there once was a linguistic relation between the Fenno-Ugrian and the Old Egyptian language, too. Which give the division between the Greek and Roman hemispheres an intersting paralellity and relation - to the paralell division of Northern Europe.
Add latest conclusions from Colin Renfrews and the Oxford scholars and we may understand that these respective cultures have developed their regional characteristics already before 7000 BP. Since that time the process of travel and trade between the Baltic and the Mediterranean cultures were on a steady growth for 4000 years - until it was corrupted when war arrived in the Mediterranean area. Some millenia later this primitive brutality also reached the lands north of Caucasia and the Alps, as the corrupted Greek and Roman finally launched their own campaigns - where there still was some loot to gain - to the north.
The chaos and confusion following the decline of the various empires have even corrupted our history books. Luckily we have reached a world were the natural sciences are able to pick up the pieces and prove some of the basic structures of these old societies, cultures and civilisations. Compared with the present facts we soon find the history books of 20 years ago to be completly outdated. Obviously there is still much left to excavate and investigate to get all the nitty-gritties straight, but there is no doubt that there have been idle and steady connections between the populations of from the Baltic to the entire east, as well as to the entire Atlantic Facade, who - in turn helped develop the Roman culture. Just as the (proto) Fenno-Ugrian "Aryans" had a certain impact on Greece, as well as Persia and India.
------------- Be good or be gone. |
Posted By: Boreasi
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2006 at 02:07
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Scythian mummies in China;
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/chinamum/taklamakan.html - http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/chinamum/taklamakan.html "The astonishing Chinese discovery of wonderfully preserved four-thousand-year-old human bodies with clothing in perfect condition in the Tarim Basin of western China is fully described by Mair and Mallory in this fascinating and well-researched account. They reach the daring, and perhaps provocative conclusion that these were `the first Europeans in China' -- a view certain to prove controversial." Colin Renfrew http://www.cs.sfu.ca/~anoop/weblog/archives/000125.html - http://www.cs.sfu.ca/~anoop/weblog/archives/000125.html ------------- Be good or be gone. |
Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2006 at 02:44
Maybe it would better if you read your links before posting them.
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2006 at 05:11
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I don't think to be so, but maybe I don't know, for example would you please tell me what do Greeks call Ymir/Yima and how do they describe him? Was there also a huge cow which nourished him with her milk?
I beleive Scythian language was more similar to European languages than the Persian language because some languages which are spoken in the north of Iran such "Gilaki" grammatically completely differ from the Persian. -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2006 at 05:56
And some see real money when there is only monopoly money; spare me the condenscending tone.
How is this even remotedly relevant to this discussion? Do you somehow suggest I believe in this version of history? I've never presented anything like this - don't put words or opinion in my mouth! Again you bring up a lot of side-discussions diverting from the topic.
The Saxons were Germanic since they spoke a Germanic language. What exactly are you aiming at?
Probably the same. But so what? The story of Adam and Eve is probably also connected to the same, that doesn't mean the Hewbrews are Persians.
Que? What have I rejected, and where. Please provide a quote from me, because I have no idea what you mean.
There are no Scandinavians east of the Sea of Bothnia, except those who have migrated the past 1200 years. I don't see your point anyway.
How about finally looking at the actual topic instead of walking into a real quagmire? Some simple facts: -Saxons spoke a Germanic language, on a different branch than the Persian languages -Saxons shared the cultural heritage (stories etc) with the other Germanic tribes -Saxons appeared in Europe several hundred years before the Scythians How do you fit these very basic facts with the theory that Saxons equal Scythians? History is based on sources. You can't just make stuff up and strain off facts that doesn't fit your theories, a la Menzies. |
Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2006 at 06:02
Take a look at the big picture instead, with a squabbling pantheon
and the underground with the river etc. For
exact comparison we have for example the dog guarding the entrance to
the underground, Garm in Norse, and Cerberus in Greek mythology. Here's a layman comparison: http://webhome.idirect.com/%7Edonlong/ - http://webhome.idirect.com/~donlong/ |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2006 at 11:37
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http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Garm - http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Garm
In http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Norse_mythology - Norse mythology , Garm was a huge four-eyed http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Dog - dog that guarded http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Helheim - Helheim , the land of the dead, living in a cave called http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Gnipa - Gnipa . It was usually covered in blood. Garm was the greatest of all dogs (excluding the http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Fenris - Fenris wolf). In some traditions, he is the dog of the http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Frost_Giant - Frost Giants . He will howl and signal the beginning of http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Ragnarok - Ragnarok , according to some eddic material. During http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Ragnarok - Ragnarok , Garm and http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/Tyr - Tyr will kill each other. Please just search four-eyed dog in Google and then reply: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=four-eyed-dog - http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=four-eyed-dog
Is it the same as the Greek three-headed and dragon-tailed dog Cerberus or famous Persian huge four-eyed dog Char-chashm (Four-eyed)? -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2006 at 12:16
| All three have probably the same origins. However, this doesn't mean Greeks and Norse are Persians.... |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2006 at 13:16
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If they were Persians then they would be called "Persian" not "Greek" or "Norse" but it means everything has not come from just Greece! -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2006 at 13:59
| Calm down, I never meant anything like that. I have no idea where the stories originate, and won't even try to make a guess. What I mean is that the similar myths is no proof to the running theme of this thread :) |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 12-Nov-2006 at 12:09
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ignore myths, lets again play with words, there are several Avestan words in the Persian language but there are many different words too. English word "River" comes from Latin "Ripa", in Greek it is "Potamos", the Persian word for it is "Rota", ... as you see these words are all similar to each other. But in Avestan language "River" is "Danu" (Ossetian "Don"), if you look at a map then you will see there is a Don river in Russia, Danube in Germany and six Don rivers in Britain. Don't you think that sometimes a same people live in these lands? -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 12-Nov-2006 at 12:26
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Wordplay is fun :) But not a tool for to determine people's movements. Words can move without people.
The earliest mention of a Don river in England comes from the 2nd century: far before the Saxons arrived - the river names of Britain predates the Saxon invasion. Don is a Celtic goddess. Also some of them is not even in the area the Saxons settled.
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 13-Nov-2006 at 06:41
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Why just Saxons?! This SK is not just in Saxon and Scythian but in Scandinavian, Scot, Schwyzdu (Switzerland) , Scanian (Sweden), ... Don't you think that there is a connection between these peoples? -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 13-Nov-2006 at 08:02
No. Not directly. Do you think there is a connection between Sparta, Spain, Spandau and Spitzbergen? |
Posted By: Leonardo
Date Posted: 13-Nov-2006 at 08:20
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 13-Nov-2006 at 08:42
Yes but if you show a large similarity between their languages, myths, geographical locations, ... -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 13-Nov-2006 at 08:53
Let me clarify, I think they are related in the sense that they are all IE peoples, which explain the language and myth issue. I do not, however, think that the Saxons and Scythians are more closely related than, say, the Franks and the Persians or Suebians and Scythians. The Saxons were Germanic just as the other tribes in that area, and not related to the Scythians (beside the aforementioned original IE speaking link). |
Posted By: Boreasi
Date Posted: 15-Nov-2006 at 22:42
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They still had a common origin - the proto IE group. We find this place of origin in the Baltic area, from where it spread in two respective direction - after ice-time. Which ended some 10.000 years ago. The origin of BOTH these branches can be found still today - on each side of the Botnic Bay-Weichsel. Thus we may speak of TWO major branches of the IE populus - that developed into the "eastern" vs. "western" cultures of Eurasia. This is also consistent with the present view of Uralic vs German languages, as well as the etnic discrepancies of east and west Eurasia respectively. The Scytians were part of the eastern culture, the Saxons were part of the western civilisation. It's that simple. Btw.: The Swedish-speaking population of Finland is still a bit mysterious. Genetic traces lead to Gotland and Finland, but not to Sweden - as was previously anticipated. That may indicate that southern Finland (and possibly the coast of Estonia) have been bi-lingual since pre-historic time. Curoisly that fits with the archeological discoveries of 1995-98, that disclosed the oldest remains of modern human beings in Europe - being some 40.000 yrs old. Which could point to the biotic refugia of the proto-caucasians that eventually introduced the IE languages...
------------- Be good or be gone. |
Posted By: cemtur
Date Posted: 24-Apr-2008 at 13:43
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Probably no relation other than being nomadic wariors or human beings.
Saxons are one of the Germanic tribes like Goths, Franks, Angles etc.
Germans are Indo-European race.
Schytian is a generic name of a proto-IE race sometime called Irano-Europeans.
Their tribes were Alans, Kimmers, Sakas etc.
Probably German tribes and Schitan tribes were in friction in part of their history when they were relocated by Hun expansion.
Not there is no relation between Saxons and Sakas either. Sakas are part of Iranian people together with Persians, Saxons are part of British people together with Angles.
Lapps (Fins), Huns (Hungarians) and Turks are also a group of similar race using the same family of language. They are not I.E. Some Schytians could be a part of first Turkic empire called Gokturks.
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Posted By: beorna
Date Posted: 24-Apr-2008 at 14:10
| Before you try to explore Saxon-Scythian relations, you should look at the Saxon origins we know. So perhaps we speak first about that and when we know where the Saxons were, we can lok if there are connections with Scythians. |
Posted By: beorna
Date Posted: 24-Apr-2008 at 23:05
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The Saxons are first mentioned in Ptolemaios. But it is shown, at least by Springer, that these Saxons are Aviones and not Saxones. The saxones so appear in sources of the 4th century first. It is Eutrop in the 2nd half of the 4th century, together with Orosius, there is Julian in the middle of the 4th century, Ammianus and Claudian at the end of the 4th century and the duodecim panegyrici latini in the end of the 4th century as well. Zosimus is writing about the Saxons even in the 6th century. There is the Hegesippus as well from the 4th or 5th century that mentioned the Saxons. The times in which those Saxons appeared are different. It is mostly in the end of the 3rd and in the 4th century, but we cannot be sure if those saxones called themselves or were called saxones at these times. So we have to say that the Saxons didn't appear long before the middle of the 4th century. Only Hegesippus is speaking about Saxones in the 70th of the 1st centry. But this is just rhetorical. When those saxones appeared in the 4th century they weren't one single tribe but a group of different nations, mostly connected with sea raids along the channel coasts. If there are saxones named with there original name they are gentes from the northern areas of Germany and from Danmark. If Saxons were Saka or Scythians, please show how those Scythians came to North Germany and Danmark, from the steppe to forestrial areas, please show how these riding warriors became so famous pirates. perhaps it's possible to show at what time they came and why they weren't mentioned in the sources. |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 08:58
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beorna, please read this thread: http://www.allempires.net/forum_posts.asp?TID=22148 - http://www.allempires.net/forum_posts.asp?TID=22148 I have posted several archaeological and historical evidences about it there. Please mention an ancient geographer who says Scythians didn't live in the north Germany? Pomponius Mela, Pliny the elder, Strabo, ... which one? For example please read what Pliny the Elder says: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0137&layout=&loc=4.27 - http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0137&layout=&loc=4.27 (Pliny the Elder, The Natural History, BOOK IV)
About the archaeological evidences, for example read these ones about Vettersfelde in North of Germany: http://zarrinkafsch-bahman.org/10.html - http://zarrinkafsch-bahman.org/10.html [Golden fish on a Scythian shield and golden shield bulge with bulls, lions, rams, panthers and goats, found in a Scythian prince's tomb near Vettersfelde, Germany] -------------
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Posted By: beorna
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 11:06
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C'mon mate, you know that in the mediterranian world those of the barbarians was devided into Celts in the West and Scythians in the East. The people in the middle of both were named Celto-Scythians. But that has nothing to do with the reality. You wouldn't search for a tribe called "Barbarians", wouldn't you. Or do you are a fellow citizen of a chinese or indian or russian or israeli guy, because we call you Asian?
When the Romans recognized that their were different tribes between riding nations in the east and celts in the West they gave up the term Celto-Scythians and called them e.g. Germani.
And Vettersfelde is one single source of Scythian invasion about 500 BC. There is no evidence that they stayed there, that they called themselves Saka and there is nothing known in the next 800 years about those guys. What's about the hundreds and thousands of non-scythian sources? I said it before somewhere else then Germans descend from Indonesians and Inuit, because in our language there is Amok, Iglu, Kajak and Anorak.
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 11:26
None of them. But we went through this already. |
Posted By: beorna
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 11:34
| By the way, all scythian objects found in the Lausitzer Kultur are within graves of the native people. Newest information from Vettersfelde show that it was no scythian "Fürstengrab" but a cultural motivated depot of people of the Lausitzer Kultur. |
Posted By: SearchAndDestroy
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 17:03
I think a connection is being made here because the first letters of the name Saxon begin with a SA. Had there not been a tribe in Germany named this, I get the feeling it wouldn't be brought up. Someone tried making a connection, and it caught like wild fire.
And even if it did go that far, Scythian was often used to describe people with similarities. And judging by how art was passed through differing cultures, it would be far of a stretch to see it spread out. One of the treasures from Vettersfeld is the Vettersfish, which is a mix of Scythian and Celtic art, showing that art exchange did happened in culture.
I don't even see a cultural connection:
Names:
Saxon: Came from the Sword Seax.
Scythian: supposedly came from the word Skula, which ment archer.
To me, that puts emphasis on their cultural style, Scythians more into archery and Horseback and Saxons seemed to reveer the sword, which many Germanic tribes did as a weapon of class and importance.
Religion:
Saxon: Germanic in origin. They did have a patron god named Seaxneat-Anglo-Saxon, and Saxnot- Continental Saxon name. But they also celebrated other Germanic gods and believed in the concept of a World Tree like the others.
Scythians:Seem to have a belief in a Proto-Indo-Iranian religion from what I could gather.
The only connection I truely see, is the Saxons beginning with SA, thats it. ------------- "A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government." E.Abbey 
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Posted By: beorna
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 17:11
| SearchandDestroy, I agree with you in most of your post. It is said that the name Saxon came from the sword sax. But it is not clear if it is correct. Sax isn't a sword in Germanic languages, it's a knife. So there could be a lot of other explanations for the word. |
Posted By: SearchAndDestroy
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 17:28
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Well, I think it's one of those unclear words, there's really no definition for when a dagger becomes a sword and so on. The Sax or Seax, was a shorter sword with one edge.
The word Sword comes from sweord, which means piercing thing. But I understand what your saying, talking of length here.
Looking at Wiki, it says there was a hadseax(shorter tool) and langseax(short sword), so it's up for interpretation I guess?
Also, due noting from Wikipedia, they make it clear that it's Germanic origin of knife, dagger, and sword. ------------- "A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government." E.Abbey
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 20:08
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This discussion is useless, nothing will be changed if I show several other sources because you believe all ancient historians and geographers didn't know Scythians and confused them with other peoples!!! "Sax" means nothing except "Knife" in the Persian and Scythian languages, the most famous Scythian weapon was "Saxar" in the Scythian language, "Sagsar" in the Persian and "Sagaris" in the Greek. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saka - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saka
For more info about Sagaris, please look at: "Histories of Herodotus, Book 7, 64", "ANABASIS, by Xenophon: Book 4, CHAPTER IV" or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagaris - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagaris -------------
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Posted By: beorna
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 21:01
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Perhaps you think it is useless. Before you do not explain how these Scythian Horse-warriors became seamen and pirates, before you do not show where your Scythians or Sakas lived between 500 BC and 350 AD, before you cannot explain why the known saxon groups are all among northsee and elbgermanic groups, before you do not show that Saxon is closer to Iranian than to every other Germanic dialect or language, I am not the one who is not able to learn. Archaeologists call a special type of sword sax, it a one-side sword. I think I do not need to explain what it looks like. The sax is first mentioned as semispata, as short sword, in the 11th century. The modern term was established in Archeology in the 19th century. This special weapon did not appear before the 5th century in Saxon. So it came about 150 years after the appearance of the saxones. The base of sahs is like the Latin word saxum something made from stone or a stone itself. It is a common indo-european expression. So whatever Saxon means or Saka means if both names have a common term, it isn't necessary to believe that both people share a common ethnic base. All data we have says that there is no Scythian origin at all, never ever. |
Posted By: SearchAndDestroy
Date Posted: 25-Apr-2008 at 22:52
I'm not sure why you believe just because they had similar names that they would be the same people. Sound and spelling don't mean similarities. Like I said above, the Scythian name seems to come from "archer, shooter", wikipedia even has it and gives three sources for it.
Scythians also were known for their archers, hence the name, and horsemanship. I don't recall Germanic people being known for either during this time.
What I do know is, that the Germanic Peoples did value their swords, and they have the Seax, which is also spelled Sax, that is accociated with Germanic people.
So, which is the likely conclusion? Saxon derived from Saka which comes from the IE word for archer, shooter, or Does Saxon come from the Germanic Sword, and on top of that, share the same langauge catagory, religion, and culture? I choose Germanic. ------------- "A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government." E.Abbey
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Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 10:23
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http://tinyurl.com/29wtxx - http://tinyurl.com/29wtxx http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saxophone - ------------- |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 13:34
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You have no source and just prefer Saxons to be not Scythians, but the historical fact is something else which is confirmed by all ancient, medieval and even modern historians, as John Milton (1608-1674), one of the greatest English historians, poets, scholars and pamphleteer, in his absolute masterpiece "The History of Britain", says: http://oll.libertyfund.org/index.php?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=1210&layout=html - http://oll.libertyfund.org/index.php?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=1210&layout=html Saxons were a people thought by good writers to be descended of the Sacæ, a kind of Scythians in the north of Asia, thence called Sacasons, or sons of Sacæ, who, with a flood of other northern nations came into Europe, toward the declining of the Roman empire; and using piracy from Denmark all along these seas, possessed at length by intrusion all that coast of Germany,§ and the Netherlands, which took thence the name of Old Saxony, lying between the Rhine and Elve, and from thence north as far as Eidora, the river bounding Holsatia, though not so firmly or so largely, but that their multitude wandered yet uncertain of habitation. -------------
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Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 14:04
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Not exactly the most authoritative historical source.
What does Geoffrey of Monmouth say?  ------------- |
Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 15:43
John Milton isn't modern, and not an historian. His History of Britain is not a scholarly work; it's that of a poet with a political agenda. I'm really surprised to someone studying history using him as a source. Do you ever question the credibility of a source? And what made you make the completely incorrect conclusion that everyone "confirmed" it? If anything it's the opposite. There are no sources, and the reason is simple: they weren't the same people. But there is no reason to repeat everything once again. For new people: just read the thread. |
Posted By: SearchAndDestroy
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 16:18
I already broke down the names, they don't make sense when using their meaning. Their culture, they don't match up. And the Saxon's Language, it's Germanic. So if your going to call the Saxons a Scythian people, you might as well call all the Germanic people Scythian too. ------------- "A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government." E.Abbey
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 16:21
Geoffrey of Monmouth also believed that Scythians lived in the north Germany and Denmark and mentions a Scythian migration to the Britain:
"History of the Kings of Britain" by Geoffrey of Monmouth, Book IV, Chapter XVII: "Scythians came from Scythia with a great fleet, and arrived in the north part of Britain, which is called Albania, and began to ravage that country." -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 16:48
He was ironic. Geoffrey is as credible as Alexandre Dumas. |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 18:12
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Styrbiorn, Who is credible? Just someone who says "there is no relation between Saxons and Scythians"? In this case I think you can't find any credible historian!! -------------
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 18:19
There is no difference between Saxon and Scythian cultures and there is certainly a strong Scythian/Saxon influence on Germanic cultures. As I said in the another thread, Saxon language is the most similar language to Persian among all Indo-European languages. -------------
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Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 18:40
Of course there is a relation. At worst they're both human.
The only question of interest would be whether there is any reason to think Saxons are any closer related to Scythians than say the Gauls or the Latins or the Poles are.
And, yes, it is difficult to find sources that point out what is obvious. ------------- |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 19:03
One of the major reasons is the Language, what do you call two peoples with the same language? -------------
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Posted By: SearchAndDestroy
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 19:06
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And how is it that their cultures have no difference? Their Religion was different, Saxons weren't exactly known for either Archery or Horsemanship. Their Language was Low Germanic. Beorna already commented on your Vettersfeld example, which doesn't seem like it was wide spread if it's in one place, and how recent developments say otherwise. And the Vettersfish, one of the examples from these sites show how art is just passed through societies and cultures as it's a mix of Celtic and Scythian Art found in traditional Germanic area. The Germanic tribes were pretty much between those two peoples.
If we are going to use art, we mind as well call Celts Germanic, and Germanic Tribes all Celtic, as they passed cultural influences on between each other. ------------- "A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government." E.Abbey
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Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 21:12
Two peoples with the same language.
Jamaicans and Englishmen speak the same language.
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Posted By: beorna
Date Posted: 26-Apr-2008 at 23:32
Would you be so kind to answer?
Saxon isn't closer to Iranian than to any other language. The closest languages to saxon are other Germanic languages. so all Germanic nations in Scandinavia and Middle Europe would have had Scythian origin if you were right. And pardon, Cyrus. You can't prefer those sources! Than I can write a russian history on the base of "war and peace". The Romans called other nations Barbarians. Do you search for Barbaria? I told you although we call the inhabitants of Asia Asians there is a difference betweeb Israelis, Indians and Japanese, or are you one nation, because we call you Asians? Saxon culture is Scythiian? Well, please let us speak about archeological places in North Germany and Danmark. Perhaps you can show me your Scythian culture. I am looking forward to hear of it.
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Posted By: King John
Date Posted: 27-Apr-2008 at 05:18
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Just to illustrate the linguistic point here are two language family trees. Both are of the Indo-European language family the first is the Centum langauges:
the second is the Satem languages: Notice that Old Saxon and the Germanic Languages appear in the Centum Language Tree, whereas Persian appears in the Satem Language tree. edit: Here is the Satem Language Branch: 
here is the Centum Branch of the IE Language tree 
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Posted By: SearchAndDestroy
Date Posted: 27-Apr-2008 at 05:23
Those are great red X's John! 
They aren't showing up, did you copy the link properly?
------------- "A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government." E.Abbey
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 27-Apr-2008 at 11:35
There are enourmous differences. Different burial rites. Different buildings. Different language. Different culture. Different everything. And for language similarity: you're simply wrong. I suggest you get in contact with a professional linguist, maybe he will convince you, seeing that you don't listen to or trust any single evidence put against you. These are the pics King John linked to, from http://www.danshort.com/ie/ - http://www.danshort.com/ie/ Cyrus, this is basicly what all linguists agree about. Why do you think they are all wrong and you know better? |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 27-Apr-2008 at 13:47
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King John, what do you know about Centum and Satem language? For example it is said "k" sound of Centum languages became sibilants such as "s" and "sh" sounds in the some words of the Satem languages, would you please give some examples in Saxon, as a Centum language?!! I think the main problem is that there is no "sh" sound in the Centum languages!! Lets discuss about this word: Saxon: Sheort Latin/Greek: Curto -------------
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Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 27-Apr-2008 at 15:11
No 'sh'-sound? There are 5 different sh sounds in Swedish, and at least one in English. In German there is two, etc. Furthermore, that the IE stem -sker evolved into short in English, but kort in other Germanic languages doesn't mean it's the rule. For example, Swedish skära (pronounced shaera), German scheren,is derived from the same word, but here it has transformed according to 'sh'. There is no rule stating that all/no words have made this transform. Please tell me where you read there are no 'sh'-sound! |